Sara's POV on Isaac and Ishmael
by MegaKitty
Summary: Self explanatory


Sara's Lesson 

Sara Lyman's thoughts during Isaac and Ishmael. I recommend reading The World According to Sara or not much of this will make sense.

Disclaimer: I own Sara nobody else

"Carol what's going on?" Sara Lyman called to CJ Cregg's assistant.  
"It's a lockdown," Carol said. "No one's allowed to leave the building"  
"Oh my God," Sara said her chest tightening. "It can't be too serious if they're letting us walk around," Carol said. "Don't worry to much honey." Sara bit her lip. "Have you seen my dad"  
"I think he's down in the cafeteria." Sara hurried down to the cafeteria where she found her dad and Donna addressing several high school students. Her dad was putting a word association on the dry erase board. "Talking about religious fanaticism," she addressed the students. All in the room turned to see the newcomer. "You all have my sympathy," Sara told them coming into the room. She paused and then turned to face them. "No wait. When all this is over, you'll all get to go home and I'll still be here with him." She turned and gave her dad a thoughtful look. Josh was smirking at her. Sara turned to the students again.  
"No you don't get any sympathy." They all laughed, and Sara could see Donna holding back a chuckle. Sara plopped down in a chair next to Donna.  
"This young lady who is now grounded for a month is my daughter Sara." Sara laughed. "You're friends with the President's daughter right?" a blonde girl sitting in the back asked.  
"Yes," Sara said. "What's that like? I mean having the secret service around you all time." Sara thought about that for a second. "Well, they mostly keep as much distance as they think is safe. Most of the time I don't really notice that they're there"  
"But do they make you feel safer?" It was an interesting question and one that Sara had actually given a good deal of thought to.  
"The opposite actually," she said. Out of the corner of her eye she saw Josh give her a look. This wasn't something she had ever talked about with her father before.  
"Having a bunch of armed guys around you makes you feel less safe?" a dark haired boy asked her.  
"Well when you stand next to someone that has a target on their back, like the first daughter or the president, no matter how many guards you have around you you're never really safe. There's a lot of rouge nations and terrorists groups who would love to get thier hands on Zoey Bartlett. But the danger isn't that Zoey will get killed. No the big danger, the one that gives the secret service nightmares is Zoey being kidnapped. Killing the President's daughter turns her into a martyr. Keeping her hostage gives the bad guys leverage and when you want something from powerful people it's all about what you have over them. But that's not what scares me. The thing that scares me is that, the bad guys don't care about me"  
"Isn't that a good thing"  
"No," Sara said. "It's the one's they care about that they let live." "You were at Rosslyn, weren't you?" another boy asked. Sara's back stiffened. This wasn't the easiest topic for her to talk about. But she sensed that these kids were nervous about what was happening around them. She could understand that and so she talked.  
"I was there," she said.  
"Were you scared?" the blonde asked her. "Absolutely," Sara said.  
"Does it make you afraid to be around Zoey? Knowing that it could get you killed." Sara smiled. It was a good question.  
"There's lots of things that can kill someone. If we avoided all of them then no one would ever drive a car, or ride on an airplane, or even leave their house"  
"But your father nearly got killed. Didn't you want to kill the guys who did it?" Sara nodded looking over at Josh.  
"Of course I did. I wanted to kill every single one of them and spit on their graves. And yes for a while it did make me afraid to be around Zoey and Charlie and anyone of any importance at all"  
"Before you came in I was telling them how your grandma wants me to get a different job," Josh remarked.  
"The "I make more money than the guy who stands in front of the bullet" story?" she asked. They all nodded. Sara turned back to the class.  
"Okay you have my sympathy again." They all laughed.  
"Yeah my Grandma worries about my dad. Worries that his job will get him killed and I do too. But my dad could die just as easily getting out of the shower. Could slip and hit his head and die that way. Then what would I do, beat the hell out of our shower?" A few of them chuckled and Donna and Josh exchanged a look.  
"A lot of people say that hate crimes happen because we're too lenient. That people take advantage of the First Amendment. Do you agree with that?" The dark haired boy asked.  
"No," Sara said. "What three racist boys did to my father has nothing to do with the first amendment. We can't legislate how people think. The first amendment says that they can have an idea, they can print their ideas in a magazine or a book, they can get together and discuss these ideas. They have that right under the constitution. Not until they used guns to express these opinions did they commit a crime. Amd maybe some think that allowing them to have these meetings and print these books and magazines puts lives in danger. But it's the same right that protects Western White Pride that protects our rights to go to any church we want to, to print stories about corrupt politicians. Think about it. If this were another place where we don't have these rights just standing here and speaking to you could get me arrested. There's not a day goes by that the president isn't burned in effigy in the paper and on the news. Just last week the president was having lunch at a cafe when someone yelled at him that he ought to be ashamed of himself. This was after passing a law allowing for gay couples to adopt a baby. What did the President do? He called back at this woman that he was, often. This woman had broken no laws, just expressed an opinion. As long as they don't physically attack the president they can say what they want. The president gets a hundred letters a day full of insults in language that would shock a sailor. As long as they don't contain the words "I'm going to kill you," it's all good. About a year ago I myself told the President that he was a stupid jackass and his position on gun control was a disgrace. I wanted to punch him in the nose but I managed to restrain myself enough to just break a glass vase. The secret service hearing the crash rushed into the room ready to put me to the floor and drag me to federal prison but the president told them to stop. Then he said "this girl's father was shot three months ago and I just told her that an important piece of gun control legislation isn't going to make it past the house, she can break whatever she wants." Can you believe that?" Sara didn't look at her father as she told this story. She hadn't told him this story and she wasn't sure what his reaction would be. She continued.  
"So many other countries, the secret service would have shot me on sight, not arrested me, and the President not only would not have cared that my father had been shot, he probably would have been the one that shot him. So yeah, this country has its faults, but when you consider the alternatives"  
"Do you really think our gun control laws are a disgrace?" the blonde asked.  
"No," Sara said. "That I said in anger. I just don't think our gun control laws work that well"  
"How do you mean?" the black haired kid asked.  
"Right now if you want a gun you have to wait five days. Do they think that in the five days I'm waiting for my gun maybe I'll have a change of heart and decide, hmm I really don't want to shoot that man after all. Gimme a break"  
"So is this a guns don't kill people, people kill people lecture?" A kid in the front said. Sara glared at that kid.  
"Daddy"  
"He's on my list, don't worry about it"  
"A kid in one of my classes did his senior report on crime control. For this report he watched crime dramas for a month. Not just the new CSI's either, but Matlock and Murder She Wrote, and all the greats. A hundred crime dramas, who can guess how many of the murders that occured in these dramas, and that's weeding out the murders that turned out to be accidents or suicide, how many of these murders do you think were committed with a gun? Who can guess"  
"Forty?" An asian kid in the back guessed.  
"Less," Sara said.  
"Twenty five?" The kid on her dad'd list asked.  
"Less," Sara said.  
"Fifteen," the blonde said.  
"Six," Sara said. "Out of a hundred murders only six of them were committed with guns. Now I know what you're all thinking, "that's television and they can't have a gun every week or they're ratings would go down. The real statistics say that guns kill more people than anything." You would be right about that but that wasn't the point the kid in my class was trying to make nor is it the point I'm trying to make. My point is that if you really want to kill someone not having a gun isn't gonna stop you. You can kill someone with a hammer, or a rock, or a brick. Or a shoe, especially those really uncomfortable stiletto's that make my ankles hurt just looking at. Are we gonna make a man wait five days to buy a hammer? Run a background check on a woman buying a pair of high heeled shoes"  
"But don't guns make it easier to kill someone?" the kid on the list asked. "I mean yeah you can kill someone with a hammer, but you gotta get in close and put some strength into it. With a gun you can stand fifty yards away and you just have to pull a trigger"  
"Exactly," Sara said. "We can't really stop people from comitting crimes. All we can really do is make it harder for them"  
"So what's the answer"  
"Kill them all," Toby Ziegler's voice chimed in. Sara sat down and let Toby talk, then Sam added his voice, then CJ and Charlie even the President and the First Lady came down to join the party. It was an interesting evening to say the least.


End file.
